Click to review the detailed system requirements information for a complete list of hardware requirements, supported operating systems, prerequisites and optional supported software, with component-level details and operating system restrictions.

Download package

How critical is this fix?

This release is a maintenance release of Rational Test Virtualization Server 8.0. It contains fixes for client reported and internally found defects.

Problems solved

Click the Fix List link in the table of contents above to review a list of the problems solved in this release.

Known side effects

The following defects were not resolved in this release.

Defect Title

Description

Services Must Be Stopped Before Upgrading Packages

Although in some cases the upgrade process for the various packages will automatically stop any installed services before attempting to upgrade there are scenarios when this doesn’t occur. This results in a failure to uninstall the service (for example, the agent.exe file). It is therefore recommended that you manually stop services before attempting to upgrade.

AIX Performance Testing Does Not Support the sysstats Probe

The sysstats probe is not provided for AIX. If a user attempts to configure an AIX-based performance test to use this probe then the following error will be shown in the console : [Error] Probe ERROR: http://localhost:4476 - Probes failed to start - Failed to start probe: System Statistics - java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: ghsystemstats (Not found in java.library.path). You must remove this probe from the configuration of the test.

Stubs Will Not Automatically Detect Port In Use On Stub Start-up

A change made in the Java 7 runtimes means that an exception is no longer passed back to Rational Integration Tester when an attempt is made to bind to an IP port that is already in use. Previously this exception was used by the stub engine to automatically allocate another port and configure the environment appropriately. This automatic use of an alternative port will no longer occur. Instead the stub will fail to start. This problem is most commonly experienced when a user attempts to start a stub on the same machine as the live system is running on. There are two workarounds for this problem. The first option is to configure the stub to use a different port. Traffic will be automatically routed to the new port so no client-reconfiguration is required. The second option is to use JVM arguments to try and replicate previous behavior. The Rational Integration Tester products have not been fully tested with these options enabled so customers are advised to use them with caution. The following two –D options must be specified in either the GHTester.ini file (for Rational Integration Tester) or the RunTests.ini file (for Rational Integration Tester Agent) in order for stubs to detect the port-in-use scenario: -Djava.net.preferIPv4Stack=true -Djava.net.preferIPv6Address=false

Stopping an Agent Results In Windows Event Log Error

On some Windows installations IBM has seen errors raised in the Windows Application Event Log when the Rational Integration Tester Agent service is stopped. This error occurs during the shut-down process of the service and does not affect the functionality of the Agent.

User Interface Freeze

Some users have encountered software freezes on Windows, particularly when moving the Rational Integration Tester user interface from a laptop screen onto an external monitor. This is believed to be caused by problems between the Java Virtual Machine and the DirectX video drivers in use on the machine. If this problem affects you then please try to resolve it by adding the following line to the GHTester.ini file in the installation directory: -Dsun.java2d.d3d=false This tells the JVM not to use DirectX. This has resolved the problems in all cases IBM is aware of so far although the UI does run more slowly. This issue has been raised with the IBM Java team.

GHDotNetUtils Must Be In the .NET Global Assembly Cache

If you are using Rational Integration Tester’s .NET integration then the GHDotNetUtils.dll file (in the root installation folder) must be added to the .NET Global Assembly Cache before .NET objects can be parsed. This is a manual step and is documented in the Rational Integration Tester Microsoft .NET Reference Guide.

Automatic Project Login Doesn’t Work on Windows

On the Windows platform the Automatic Login project option does not work correctly. This means that secured projects run from the command line or from QC cannot be opened.

Left-to-Right and Right-To-Left Strings

If a message element is a string that contains both left-to-right and right-to-left text in the same element then the string may not be displayed properly in the user interface. It will be published correctly.

Date Formatting Strings

Rational Integration Tester uses Java to format date strings for validation purposes. The IBM JRE acts differently from the Oracle/Sun JRE used by earlier versions of GHT Tester for one unusual format string. Specifically, a date of "123" parsed using an input format of “yyy” with output format MMDDy will be formatted as “0101123” by the IBM JRE. Previous versions of GH Tester (using the Oracle JRE) would have formatted this as “010123”. This is unlikely to cause problems as it is unlikely customers will be using single-character year output format strings.

Library Manager ‘Browse For File’ dialog

When you first open the browse/edit dialog from the Library Manager application (to select a file) the directory ‘up’ button will not work. If a different directory is selected the ‘up’ button will then work. This has been confirmed as bug in the IBM JRE.

If you are running Rational Integration Tester using an evaluation license then when you launch the “Tools Application”, by choosing the Source Control option in the menu or by creating/editing a data model, a dialog will appear warning that you are using a trial license. This dialog will not appear once you have installed a full license.

Silent Install of Rational Test Control Panel

Depending on how the silent installation response file has been generated the “Security Configuration” tool may still be launched at the end of the process. The imcl tool is known to work correctly and will suppress the dialog. As Rational Test Control Panel is a server-based product silent installations are not expected to be common but IBM will look to improve this in future releases. To use imcl within the ${IM}/eclipse/tools directory run “./imcl-c”, specifying the response file when prompted.

Blank Panel Appears During Solaris Installation

During installation of Rational Integration Tester, Rational Integration Tester Agent and the Rational Integration Tester Platform Pack on Solaris (32 bit) a blank panel will appear during the Installation Manager install process. This has no adverse effects on the installation process and the user can simply click Next.

The Agent Can Only be Started From its Installed Directory (Unix)

On Unix, if an attempt is made to start the agent from a directory other than the one it is installed in then it will fail to start. For example: /opt/GH/RIT-Agent/Agent –consolelog Whereas if you are within the installed directory then: ./Agent -consolelog works correctly.

Change history

8.0.0.1 is the first fix pack for Rational Integration Tester, which is a component in the Rational Test Workbench, Rational Performance Tester Server and Rational Test Virtualization Server offerings.

An existing 8.0 installation can be updated to 8.0.0.1 by using IBM Installation Manager’s update facility.

It is also possible to install 8.0.0.1 by checking for updates before starting an 8.0 installation within Installation Manager.

A small number of enhancements have been added to 8.0.0.1.

It is now possible to install a Rational Integration Tester Agent in a mode that only allows the execution of probes. This type of installation does not require the Agent to be PVU-licensed and is intended for use in Performance Testing scenarios.

The Recording Studio perspective has a new “Playback” button which will replay recorded publish and send request events. The user can specify the “pacing” speed with which messages are published (as-fast-as-possible, defined interval or as-original). Rules and functions in the Rules Cache may be used to allow basic modifications to message contents as they are published. Playback will work on events that have been exported and re-imported (into the same project).

A File Publisher has been added to the list of Result Publisher types. This enables a suite report to be published to a specified location on disk. The File Publisher will also write out results in JUnit XML format.

A complete set of Eclipse Help jar files are now provided with the product installation. These are an Eclipse-Help compatible version of the PDF manuals.

Technical support

Tab navigation

Visit the IBM Support Portal to configure your support portal experience and review FAQs, lists of known problems, fixes, and a wealth of important support information.

Visit developerWorks to access an online collection of tutorials, sample code, standards, forums and other resources provided by experts at IBM to assist software developers using Rational tools including access to the IBM RFE Community.

Visit the Jazz Community if you use a Rational product created using the Jazz platform to interact directly with the Jazz development team and other community members, download product trials and betas and track developement progress.

Helpful Hints For Obtaining Technical Assistance:

Before you contact IBM Rational Software Support, gather the background information that you need to describe the problem. When you describe a problem to an IBM software support specialist, be as specific as possible and include all relevant background information so that the specialist can help you solve the problem efficiently. To save time, know the answers to these questions:

What software versions were you running when the problem occurred?

Do you have logs, traces, or messages that are related to the problem?

Can you reproduce the problem? If so, what steps do you take to reproduce it?

Is there a workaround for the problem? If so, be prepared to describe the workaround.